O’Connor Capital Partners won approval for $2.8 million in assistance for a 175-unit workforce housing project in Riviera Beach.
The funds, approved by the Riviera Beach City Council Wednesday night, will pay for most of the water, sewer and impact fees associated with Marina Annex, a 77-foot tall apartment development that will include a 15,000-square-foot community center named after the late Edward Rodgers, the first Black circuit court judge in Palm Beach County.
The development team includes New York-based O’Connor, West Palm Beach-based Urban Farmers, the Riviera Beach Housing Authority and the Alpha Phi Alpha Foundation.
Slated to start construction by the end of this year on a 4-acre parcel at 251 West 11th Street, Marina Annex will have one-, two- and three-bedroom units reserved for families earning between 80 percent and 120 percent of Palm Beach County’s area median income. The AMI in Palm Beach County is $107,600.
The units will be marketed to teachers, police, and healthcare professionals, said Terry Booty, president of Urban Farmers. The project will also include about 4,000 square feet of retail that will be offered to Riviera Beach-based entrepreneurs at discounted rental rates, he said.
The $75 million development will provide 15 permanent jobs and a $4 million investment in storm water management that will also benefit the neighboring Boys & Girls Club, Booty said.
The project received $53 million from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and $15 million from Palm Beach County’s Housing & Economic Development department, Booty said.
The CRA grant will defray the cost of impact fees, which city officials have contemplated increasing by at least 300 percent to help pay for infrastructure improvements needed to accommodate a slew of development projects that are being proposed in Riviera Beach.
The city is bracing for a possible budget shortfall as it struggles to pay for a $400 million revamp of its water plant, Council Member KaShamba L. Miller-Anderson noted. She pointed out that the city gave the housing authority land for the future Marina Annex project, only for the agency to sell the property to for-profit developers. (Marina Annex Housing acquired the development site for $2 million in February 2025.)
Council Chair Bruce Guyton said the city’s contribution was small compared to what HUD and the county provided.
“If we are going to have housing for low to moderate income families … and we are not willing to give $2 million, good luck for us on future projects,” Guyton said.
The Related Group’s Related Urban received $1.5 million from the CRA for the Residences at Riviera Beach, a 149-unit workforce housing project. And the Riviera Beach Community Redevelopment Corporation received millions of dollars from the CRA for a townhouse project called Villa L’Onz that’s under construction next to the Marina Annex development site.
The Marina Annex development site is a few blocks west of where SobelCo intends to build a 1.2-million-square-foot mixed-use project with 508 market-rate condo units at West 11th Street and Broadway. It’s half mile from Marina Village, a 90-acre property owned by the city where Forest Development is negotiating a 99-year lease for the development of a $556 million phased project that will include a 20-story Marriott Autograph Collection hotel, a 20-story condo and a 10-story convention center and meeting hall. That’s where the Related Group, BH Group, and Tezral Partners are building Residences at Marina Village and a 20-story market rate apartment tower called Gallery at Marina Village.
Led by CEO Bill O’Connor, O’Connor Capital Partner’s portfolio includes The Esplanade luxury retail plaza in Palm Beach and the Galleria at Fort Lauderdale mall. Last summer, O’Connor acquired Delray Corner, an 86,000-square-foot shopping center in Delray Beach, for $28.8 million.
Booty’s Urban Farmers company is the developer of the Eighth Avenue Commons, a planned 200-unit workforce housing project in Hallandale Beach. Booty has acted as an advisor for the Riviera Beach Housing Authority, which intends to manage Exact Capital’s planned 280-unit, mixed-income Riviera Gateway project at 2600 and 2601 Broadway.